Physicians could face increased requirements when renewing their state medical licenses under a draft model policy currently being evaluated by the Federation of State Medical Boards.
Under the draft policy, relicensure would become more comprehensive and require that physicians demonstrate continuing skills and knowledge in their area of practice. As proposed, the maintenance of licensure process would closely mirror the requirements that the American Board of Medical Specialties has in place for maintenance of certification. The draft policy is a model that state medical boards could use, but individual states would determine whether or how it would be implemented.
Over the last 5 years, the Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB) has been considering how state medical boards could change these policies to ensure that licensees are competent. The organization's House of Delegates approved guiding principles for developing maintenance of licensure and called for research on the impact that the requirements would have on state medical boards and physicians.
Once that research is complete, the draft maintenance of licensure policy would likely be considered by the FSMB House of Delegates at their meeting next May, said Carol Clothier, vice president of strategic planning and physician competency initiatives for the FSMB.
The idea is to take advantage of activities physicians already are doing to demonstrate their competence and use those to satisfy these requirements, she said.
If the maintenance of licensure policy is accepted by the FSMB House of Delegates, it would be up to individual states and territories to decide if they wanted to adopt, revise, or ignore the model policy.
Since states would make these changes legislatively, it's unlikely to happen quickly, said Dr. James C. Puffer, president and chief executive officer for the American Board of Family Medicine (ABFM).
Family physicians who remain current and active with maintenance of certification will have nothing to worry about, he said, since the draft model policy would allow maintenance of certification to satisfy the requirements of maintenance of licensure.
Family physicians may be better prepared for these requirements than physicians in other specialties since family medicine does not grant lifetime board certification. And so far the participation rate in maintenance of certification has exceeded expectations. Historically, the ABFM recertification rates have been around 75%-80%, but data from the first two cohorts going through maintenance of certification shows rates above 80%.